vignettes

While in Piedmont recently, the international crew of sommeliers and journalists I was travelling with had a fun encounter, which caught us a bit off-guard.

You see, there are relatively few things that drive folks like us bananas when on wine trips, but the big two are:

A tour and lengthy explanation of a winery's stainless steel tanks.

A tour and lengthy explanation of a winery's bottling line.

It's not that these things aren't interesting or valuable components of a winery's operation, it's just that on some trips we get shown these things at length on at pretty much every single winery visit and, for the most part, they're all the same. It sounds like a silly, trivial beef - but when you're on the fifth day of touring a wine region at the pace of three or four wineries per day, these portions of the tour can be tedious and, frankly, a waste of time. We've all seen 'em; we all get it...

But.

We were about to be shown yet another bottling line on one afternoon, and as we all began to roll our eyes and elbow one another, we all suddenly perked up.

IT WAS A BAG-IN-BOX BOTTLING LINE!!!

The majority of us had never seen once in action, and after a quick tour -hilariously - it was tough to pry us away! It was mesmerizing! The photo-ops! The Instagram potential!

And so, for those of you who haven't seen one do its thing before, here you go.

(For the record, we later had the opportunity to try this Vinchio-Vaglia Montecroce Piemonte D.O.C. Cortese outta the box. Perfumed, a touch musky and floral on the nose, the palate is then drenched with guava, lemon curd and young pineapple, with medium acid and juuust a hint sweetness on the finish. If it were available here in Vancouver, it'd probably make occasional appearances in my fridge, particularly during these warm, summer days.)